Rx For Better Roads: Higher Taxes, More Citizen Input

March 13, 1990|By Mike Berry of The Sentinel Staff

SANFORD — Seminole County politicians must show more leadership and probably raise taxes to avoid a road crisis, a consultant said Monday.

County commissioners received the prescription from their consultant, Roger Neiswender, in a meaty work session. Considering Seminole's growth rate and the amount of money dedicated to roads, the county is heading toward ''serious problems'' in meeting minimum transportation standards, he said.

Neiswender said in an interview the county will have little choice but to raise taxes for roads as it gets ready to file a comprehensive growth management plan with the state next year.

''It's going to be a tough time,'' said Neiswender, a former county administrator. ''You've got elections coming up. You have all these competing demands . . . But it's time to put the board in the driver's seat.''

During the two-hour meeting, Neiswender laid out a series of steps commissioners should take to avoid the kind of transportation problems that could lead to a building moratorium. They included:

- Commissioners need to give county staff more direction on road projects, through many more ''roll-up-your-sleeves'' work sessions, Neiswender said.

''The staff and board are going to have to get into a lot more detailed give-and-take.''

Typically, board votes are hardly a consensus, they are too narrow or vague and there is too much interpretation left for the staff to make, he said.

- The public needs to be included in road planning earlier. Public hearings are held way after preliminary engineering plans. As a result, Neiswender said, the public often feels deceived or dictated to.

''Let's go out and see those people. They live there. They know things the design engineers don't.''

That doesn't mean the commission has to pander to neighborhood whims with every road project, he said. Sometimes tough, unpopular decisions must be made.

- Commissioners must realize no decision can be made in a vacuum. Road construction and expansion, population projections and land-use changes are indelibly intertwined, Neiswender said. When deciding whether to widen a road to four or six lanes, for instance, the county will have to look at every other road affected, he said.

Neiswender said the alternative to raising more money for roads is to lower standards. To a degree, the county will set its own standards in the comprehensive plan due to the state by next April. But it must meet some kind of minimum and must maintain its standards, or ultimately face a halt on building, he said.

''The real situation is woeful undercommitment of resources to transportation. You're sitting on the hot seat,'' he told commissioners.

Neiswender was hired in November as a chief consultant following the resignation of county manager Ken Hooper.